By NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Coffee at the Cosmo, Cosmosphere’s free speaker series, returns on Thursday.
"Thursday at 9 a.m., from 9 a.m. to 10 a.m., we have an amazing guest speaker from NASA," said curator Shannon Whetzel. "She also was a part of our camp program when she was younger. She is going to speak to us about space suits and I am going to provide some artifacts for those in person to look at. We'll also try to get a look at them for our online crowd."
Kristine Larson Davis, a spacesuit engineer at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston and Cosmosphere Camps alumna, is part of a team designing the new xEMU suit that will be worn by the first woman and next man to explore the Moon as part of the Artemis program.
"Kristine will be talking a little bit more about the present day and give a little bit of background and history," Whetzel said. "The artifacts I will be showing are more of the shuttle era. I've got some boots and we've got a lower torso and not just suit parts, but also while you're wearing the suit, you'll need to be able to get a drink while you're on your six-hour space walk, so I've got an in suit drink bad and also, up there in space, you don't really have the opportunity to send your space suit to a tailor or anything like that if you poke a hole. I have a maintenance kit like they would have up there if they need to fix just a small part of their suit."
Davis will be presenting remotely via Zoom and share her NASA-insider view of the spacesuit engineering process.
"Part of the EMU suit development was that it would be more versatile, more people could wear it," Whetzel said. "Not exactly one size fits all, but a lot closer to that, in comparison to the Apollo era."
In the old days, the spacesuits were custom-made for the people that wore them.